The Hard Lessons

sermon by Carrie Eikler
(For student/teacher recognition Sunday)
Matthew 19:13-15, 1 Timothy4:12
Romans 12:9-21
September 4, 2011

When Torin and I were taking pre-natal classes in preparation for Sebastian’s birth, we were probably the most anxious either of us had ever been before in our lives. Of course, all the pregnant moms were anxious about the unknowns of first labors and all the dads or other support people were anxious about helping their laboring loved ones.

We all had Hollywood version births in mind: screaming, swearing, lashing out all sorts of profanities with the belief that once it was all over we’d be laughing and crying and saying “I don’t know what came over me. I just wasn’t myself.”

The nurse teaching the class nipped that in the bud. She told us “In labor you think that you’ll act in ways that are totally not who you are. The reality is, you become more of who you really are than you’d like to admit.” And I discovered…it’s true.

All the demons, the insecurities, unloving, raging parts of you that lie under the surface-- they come out. As does the best strength, perseverance, and love that could find its home in you…it’s all put to work to bring forward this new life.

And those are hard lessons to learn. To be put to the test and find what’s really there. What you would rather not have other people know about you, what behaviors and actions you feel you are above.

Now, five years later give me a hot September night when I’m exhausted and trying to put two wiggly boys down to sleep and you can bet I see the worst in myself. And the boys are seeing it to.

I don’t like those lessons, what they reveal to me…about me. But I have to learn from them.

We like to believe that we grow in wisdom as we grow in years. That somehow, it coincides automatically. And to an extent, I believe it’s true. I do feel I am wiser now than I was ten years ago. And I certainly believe I am wiser now than people who are 10 years younger me, that’s for sure… (ha, ha.)

And we think when we are wise, or when we know we are smart, we think that we are the teachers. That we know. That others can learn from us. Sure, we know there is still more to learn, and we’ll get to that when time allows. And that’s the thing. We prefer to have control over how we learn and from whom we learn. We would like to choose the way in which wisdom comes to us.

We’d like wisdom to come to us from the wise and sagely advice a friend gives us over a cup of tea…
Or the brilliant scholar in invigorating classroom discussions…
Or in the quiet of a thoughtful book that gently opens our mind…

But, when Jesus called the little children to him…when he invited tax collectors and prostitutes to be his friends…when he submitted to the cross rather than any other fate, he taught us some hard lessons. And not in the ways we think we would prefer to learn

Lessons like, look to the wisdom and sage teachings of children (even when they are annoying you)
Lessons like…struggle with what it is you are so judgmental about to see how it keeps you from loving your neighbor.
Lessons like… it is in our suffering that we can see the redeeming work of God with such raw clarity that we can’t help but be resurrected.

These lessons aren’t taught to us in ways we’d prefer.

But we certainly learn from them. And we’d probably learn those lessons most deeply if we didn’t try to control just how life’s teachers bring us the lesson.

Last week, we looked at the scripture in Romans just before today’s, about not conforming to this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your minds. And I spoke about Jon Kabat-Zinn’s work on mindfulness meditation and its effect on reducing stress. He and his wife, Myla, wrote a book called Everyday Blessings: The Inner Work of Mindful Parenting. And in it, they compare children to Little Zen Masters that we have invited into our lives.

Jon and Myla reflect on training in the Zen Buddhist tradition as, “arduous and demanding, intense and unpredictable, wild and crazy, and very loving and funny. It’s also very simple, and not so simple.” The teachers of Zen, the Zen masters (to which they are comparing children, remember), ‘don’t explain themselves. They just embody presence. They don’t get hung up in thinking, or lost in theoretical musings about this or that. They are not always consistent. [They give] us endless challenges that cannot be resolved through thinking [such as “what is the sound of one hand clapping?”].

Granted, we are not part of the Zen tradition, but we certainly can recognize the Zen-like masters in our lives. Those teachers of hard lessons. Children, unquestioningly are like that. That’s could be why Jesus used them in the way he did.

He’s may not only being using them as an example of how we should be, but he may just be revealing to the people what kind of messiah he was by honoring and blessing the children, and what they bring, how they see.

His whole approach was like a Zen master: not explaining, just embodying. By taking on and redeeming suffering (and we think “how could he do that? It doesn’t make sense”) By loving others in their brokenness, and welcoming them at the table (and we think, how could we do that? It seems impossible)

And this is the Jesus Paul believes in, too. Which is why it is probably easy for Paul to just fling out the list virtues that he does, our scripture lesson for today. It is basically restating what Jesus was about. The hard lessons that Jesus spent three years of his ministry embodying, Paul puts in a simple, but not so simple list. And Paul isn’t any better at explaining these to us either.

Now, if you are like me, you read this with somewhat of a blasé attitude. “Yes yes let love be genuine. Mmmhmm, love you enemies, that’s right. Yes, certainly…don’t be haughty. Of course, extend hospitality to strangers.”

When a big list like this is thrown at me, it is easy to disengage. Maybe I could commit it to memory and recite it like the Ten Commandments or the Beatitudes, but what happens then? Well for me, it becomes just something to recite, nothing more. Good things to aim for but if I’m not willing to really work at them, then at least I can recite the list

Because really, while we can train ourselves to rattle off the list, we will struggle to really learn these hard lessons.

These things are their own little Zen masters. Not clear, or consistent. Some are obviously hard, like bless those who persecute you (we need to think, what does persecution look like? What does it mean to “bless” someone when I am hurt? How would I receive a blessing when I have hurt someone?)

And others seem easy but when you get right down to it, they do touch some of those little demons inside, like “rejoice with those who rejoice.” Even when you think they don’t deserve the good things they have received? Even if you start to feel jealous? Even when your own sadness seems to overcome…rejoice?

If we take them each, they are really hard lessons. Which is why in your hand, you are holding one, only one. Now I’m sure you’ve looked at it already, but look at it again. You are going to invite this one lesson into yourself.

Read it slowly…mutter the words out loud to yourself. How does it sound outside your head, when you put it “out there.” Read it over a few times.

Now close your eyes for a few moments and see the words in your mind.
Invite them into your soul…
Assume that this is not as easy or straight forward as you initially think.
Assume that this is not too hard or beyond your reach.
Assume that this will teach you something about yourself, about your God, and about your own transformation.

[pause]

You may open your eyes now if you like…
Now, believe that being mindful to this one thing will change you, just as the leaves outside are gradually changing.
Believe that the Holy Spirit strengthens you when you give serious intention to the transformation of your spirit. When you are willing to learn.

I hope you take this home. Tape it on your mirror. Put it on your fridge and make this one thing your discipleship invitation for the fall. Your Jesus-Paul-Zen master lesson.

We don’t choose the way we learn the hard lessons. But it is planted now within you. It will grow, and in time, you will be able to teach others, in wisdom and in truth.